Godzilla: Final Wars

GODZILLA FINAL WARS may not please Godzilla purists but it delivers the goods for everybody else, -at least those with some knowledge of Godzilla lore. I saw it with a packed house of G fans at Subway Cinema's annual New York Asian Film Festival and it was the perfect audience for a film as steeped in the kaiju mythos as this one. Every time a new monster appeared on screen the crowd applauded or, rather, they applauded once that monster became recognizable, since the director often teases us with quick cuts and blurry motion before giving us a good, steady full-body shot. There are 15 monsters in all, many friendly old faces and some obscure ones, but all recognizable to longtime Godzilla fans.

The other real pleasure for G fans is the star-studded cast. Three venerable stars of older kaiju films turn up, two in major roles. Akira Takarada (star of the original GODZILLA, 1954) plays the UN Secretary General and Kumi Mizuno (the gorgeous leading lady from MONSTER ZERO, FRANKENSTEIN CONQUERS THE WORLD, WAR OF THE GARGANTUAS and more) plays the Commander of the Earth Defense Force. In a smaller role, Kenji Sahara turns up in a lab coat assisting the attractive young female biologist (Rei Kikukawa) assigned to investigate the monster attacks. Also on hand are Jun Kunimura (Boss Tanaka in KILL BILL VOL. 1); Kane Kosugi, a martial arts star in his own right and son of "ninja" star Sho Kosugi; and one other gorgeous actress, Maki Mizuno, who plays the biologist's newscaster sister. Masahiro Matsuoka plays Ozaki, the lead mutant hero who uses MATRIX-style martial arts to fight the alien invaders. Don Frye plays the tough American captain who pilots the Gotengo (the flying, burrowing ship from ATRAGON) and stands up to the aliens in several memorable confrontations. A martial artist/wrestler/extreme fighter known primarily in Japan, Frye speaks all his lines in English in the Japanese print I saw, while everyone else speaks Japanese to him.

The film's all-star monster cast and alien invasion plot seem derived chiefly from DESTROY ALL MONSTERS (1968), but with everything pumped up to hyper speed. The film is incredibly fast-paced and filled with action, either in the form of battles between monsters or martial arts fights/ray-gun shootouts between the human and mutant defenders and the alien invaders. Since the monsters attack numerous cities around the world (including New York, Paris, Shanghai, Tokyo--of course--and even Vancouver!) there turns out to be more mass destruction in this film than in all other G films combined.

One can argue that the whole production is sheer lunacy, but it's lunacy done with conviction and affection. The director clearly knows and loves Godzilla films and he conveys that love while also adding new twists and imaginative touches (e.g. Anguirus, the spike-covered ankylosaurus, curling up into a spiked ball to launch a rolling attack). One's overall reaction depends on any number of factors, but this should definitely be seen by all kaiju fans.

For those who love to see Godzilla as the true, unstoppable King of Monsters, GFW is a true return to form. Godzilla has never seemed stronger, or been portrayed as more of a force to be reckoned with. However, it is this, and only this that seems to find familiar ground with the rest of the series.

Godzilla:Final Wars is a drastic and puzzling step in a different direction for the Godzilla franchise. While TOHO should be given credit for being willing to take their creation and franchise in a different direction, they should also be more careful in the manner to which they do so.

Godzilla: Final Wars feels like many different movies in one, and by this I do not mean any of the films to which it owes it's inspiration. At times, the film feels like it is a pure action take on the King of Monsters. At other times, it feels like it is an exercise in camp excess. But it is these two varying points that makes Godzilla: Final Wars both hard to classify, and hard to comprehend. The film suffers from not having a set mood, or set atmosphere for the viewer to really settle into. The plot and atmosphere simply take too many turns too many times for the viewer to get comfortable with the film.

I won't go into too many plot details, as I don't want to ruin the film or any of it's points for those who have yet to see it. But briefly, this film takes a cue from the Godzilla films of the Showa era and brings back the Xilians, once again bent on world domination.

GFW features a huge all star cast of kaiju. However, the shear number of kaiju may be impressive, their appearances are not always of the same result. Kaiju such as Hedorah, King Seesar, and yes Minilla are sorely out of place in this film, or if nothing else, sorely misused. While I applaud Ryuhei Kitamura for casting a kaiju all star cast, I feel that fewer monsters would have sufficed had they been given more screen time, and stayed a little truer to form.

However some of the films kaiju make truly great returns, most notably Rodan, Angillas, and most importantly..Gigan. These three monsters are my personal favorites in Godzilla Final Wars. Rodan looks better than ever, and while the monsters screen time and fight time are limited, it makes a fantastic impact during a scene in NYC. Angillas, a long time favorite of so many GFAN's, is given his respect in GFW. The monsters new design is fantastic, and the kaiju maintains its beloved fighting spirit and comes complete with some new tricks to boot. However, it is Gigan that steals the show. Gigan returns to the Godzilla franchise, and in many respects does so in the wrong forum. This Gigan deserved a chance to face Godzilla in it's own movie. The new design is amazing, sleek and deadly, with new weapons, and old weapons never before seen.

Overall, Godzilla Final Wars is an entertaining film, but it is certainly not the best of the Millennium Series, nor the best movie it could have been given the talent and resources at it's disposal. The film is an interesting take on the Godzilla franchise, but note the farewell that the Big G deserves. If TOHO were smart, they would allow Godzilla his time away from the screen, and take some of their newly revamped kaiju and give them their chances at real screen time in some new adventures.

My favorite Godzilla movie since TERROR OF MECHAGODZILLA (Toho; 1975)! Since 2000, I felt the series was a string of indistinguishable films. I was also never impressed by the 'heisei' or post-GODZILLA 1985 series. So for better or worse, GODZILLA: FINAL WARS stands out. It tends to emulate the more over-the-top Godzilla movies of the 1970s, which I certainly don't mind. Instead of following the exact same pattern as all of GODZILLA 2000's (Toho; 2000) predecessors, GODZILLA: FINAL WARS takes a more creative approach and swipes ideas from THE MATRIX (Silver Pictures; 1999), all them X-Men comic books, and spatterings of typical Japanese TV hero stuff. While all these mixed genres may not play off each other perfectly and we have a mess of a film at times, at least we've finally got a Godzilla movie that actually stands out from the rest (I think the only other stand out film is 1971's GODZILLA VS. THE SMOG MONSTER).

However, its over-the-top approach was headache-inducing: The fast pace is overkill (in sharp contrast to every movie in the series starting with GODZILLA 1985), and reminded me of crazy Hong Kong fantasies of the 1980s or 1990s, specifically Tsui Hark farces like ZU: WARRIORS OF THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN (Golden Harvest; 1983). It got frustrating trying to keep up, amid all the quick edits and flashy gimmicks which hide a fairly simple story we've seen before (space invaders attack Earth and control giant monsters). Yet despite all this, I still like the movie a lot, and consider it an improvement over everything to come out of the series in the 1980s and 1990s.

The human characters at least offer old timers like Kumi Mizuno and Akira Takarada some interesting roles, and I didn't recognize Akira Takarada right away. The younger actors are interesting too-- better than the generic, boring soldiers of the last few movies, at any rate. The main villain, in his typical post-MATRIX black cape, has this eerie make-up, but is so emotional and bumbling that he's more clown-like than scary.

Many Godzilla fans dislike the movie, but with me, you're seeing it from the point-of-view of a fan of superheroes & martial arts. So I think this puts me in a position to evaluate & appreciate the over-all movie on another level. When the heroes and villains clash, it's fairly exciting action, but being a post-THE MATRIX movie, everything is over-enhanced with CGI junk. Their plight is diminished because we know there's really no thrilling stunt work. I met action choreographer & stuntman Tsutomu Kitagawa last year, and we did some comical martial arts moves for video cameras. His karate skills are first rate, having studied at Sonny Chiba's Japan Action Club and made his debut in superhero programs such as the classic AKUMAIZER 3 (Toei; 1974) series. Unfortunately, his work is diminished because of the CGI 'enhancements' which give all the choreography & stunts an artificial feel. What's the point of a high-speed motorcycle chase that isn't real? It's like a radio ventriloquist; simply defeating the purpose. While it might not impress the average dai-kaiju fan, there are fans of superheroes & martial arts who will find fun in GFW. Though the typical Godzilla fans might hate GFW, the typical Kamen Rider fans will like it.

There's an impressive list of nostalgic names on hand: Not just Godzilla and Ghidrah, but Rodan, Mothra, Atragon, King Seesar, Minya, Manda, Angilas, Hedorah, Gino, Spiga, Gimantis, and Ebirah all make appearances. This tops the masterpiece DESTROY ALL MONSTERS (Toho; 1968) in that respect (sheer quantity). It's always exciting to see old favorites return. Angilas looked pretty damn slick, but I didn't like the designs of the two new (and over-used!) Gigans, felt Gimantis & Rodan relied too much on CGI artificiality, I never liked the "Godzilla with ears" look, and thought the meager cameos by Gino & Hedorah were way too brief and abrupt; amounting to little more than in-jokes than actual monster battles. Sad to say, for the first time ever, I thought Minya had one of the better designs and was the most interesting monster! So I guess I didn't like the way all the monsters looked, but just seeing them all in one film made it amusing.

All in all, it strikes me as a great film and if it wasn't the "final" (?) film in the series, I would consider it a step in the right direction. -Damon

Neither did the makers of this movie ... that's why they took the US-Godzilla "for a ride here"! But that's not the only creature from the Gojira/Godzilla past that is brought back. I don't if every creature is on display here, that was in a previous movie, but there quite a few of them. So if you know your Gojira movies, you'll have plenty to enjoy from those "cameos" alone!

You might have guessed it already, but this movie doesn't take itself serious, too. It's a great fun ride and it never aims for anything else than this promise. And since it delivers on that promise/premise, it's a pretty good movie (for me at least)! You will even enjoy it, if you're not familiar with the back story of Gojira, just bare in mind, that this is mostly old-school effects (man in costume kind of effects, so to speak). There are occasionally a few CGI, but it's mostly old school. And that's the fun of it! So it just depends on your expectations, on how you'll like the movie ...

The story of "Godzilla Final Wars" is like "Godzilla Vs. Monster Zero", "Independence Day", and "Matrix" rolled into one. An alien from Planet X comes to earth pretending to warn earth people about the danger of planetoid Golath which will be impacting earth in 11000 hrs. They also remove monsters that are on rampage in several cities around the world. But of course this is all just a show to win favors from the earthlings. They are secretly out to destroy civilization and transform earth people into human cattle. Earth has seen birth of mutants which have special powers. They all have the same "M" gene that people from planet X has. Ozaki (Masahiro Matsuoka) is one of them, and like Neo in Matrix, he's the only mutant who's powerful enough to beat the Planet X invasion force leader (Kazuki Kitamura). Earth's last chance to save itself is the core Earth Defence Force team on Gotengo (Atragon), and Godzilla who's kept in hibernation. Gotengo goes on a mission to wake Godzilla up and confront all the monsters under the influence of Planet X leader and destroy their mother ship.

Out of all Godzilla movies made in the 21st century, which was on again off again at best, this one in my opinion is the best. Being the 50th anniversary Godzilla movie, this movie doesn't skimp on nostalgia. The old faces like Akira Takarada (Gojira '54), Kenji Sahara (Rodan), Kumi Mizuno (Matango) shows up to say fare well to the franchise that lasted 50 years. CGI special effects are also more realistic on this movie than say the '90s Mothra franchise.

On the minor note, music by Keith Emerson is terrible, and acting is as soul less as the actors themselves. Wardrobe is unbelievably bad, and the plot - well, there's really no plot to speak of.

Godzilla fights the following monsters: "Gigan (1)", "American Godzilla (Called here Zilla)", "Kumonga", "Kamacuras", "Anguilas", "Rodan", "King Caesar", "Hedorah", "Ebirah", "Monster X", "Gigan (2)" and "King Gidorah". Mothra and Minilla (Son of Godzilla) makes appearances as well. I had some loathing about Toho's poor selection of talents, and sometimes cheezy special effects until I heard they make these movies for under $10 million, and I had renewed respect for Japanese efficiency (average Hollywood picture costs $64 million). This movie seems to be made on slightly bigger budget than usual and effects are better. So after some disappointing shows since the death of Heisei Godzilla, this movie recaptures the excitement of Godzilla movies, and in my opinion, this is more like it !